Tuesday, 13 May 2008
10.00pm

Artscape's popular documentary series Artists At Work returns to ABC TV.
This week we enter the rhinestone-studded, fertile and fruity world of William Eicholtz, one of Australia's most distinctive contemporary sculptors.
"With my sculptures I'm trying to create a feeling of sensuality- but also a sense of fun with a very camp sense of the truth revealed through artifice", says Eicholtz.
Winner of the 2005 Helen Lempriere Sculpture Award, William's work respectfully nods to European art history whilst winking wryly at Australia's pastoral heritage. In William's world, bush icons, like his favoured sheep, are given a baroque make-over complete with adorable dog-like faces and abundant fleeces overflowing with leaves, flowers and fruit.
In this program, we follow William's process as he creates three of his iconic sheep sculptures for the courtyard of TarraWarra Museum of Art - a prestigious gallery located in the picturesque wine country of Victoria's Yarra Valley.
William likens his sheep to the Three Graces (daughters of Zeus who embodied beauty, charm and joy) featured in Botticelli's painting La Primavera. Using preliminary sketches and miniature clay maquettes as a guide, William overcomes the limitations of a sheep's anatomy - not by a visit to a sheep station - but by one to the Royal Melbourne Dog Show!
"I'm much more inspired by the clipped sculptural forms of standard poodles than by any real sheep" says William. "I've never been anywhere near a farm."
Working from his studio in the Melbourne suburb of Windsor, William problem-solves the armature and engineering difficulties that come with large-scale outdoor sculptures. It's a process that shows William's classical sculptural skills but also his contemporary style and versatility with modern day materials.
Amidst the hilarious antics of William's pet dogs, the sheep are painted and finally glazed. But are they quite what the gallery expected?
Artscape: Artists At Work: William Eicholtz will be repeated on ABC2 - Sunday, May 18 at 7:00pm